Contents

Summary

A girl named Becky who longs for a perfect fantasy life is taking out the trash and finds a painting that she takes home. She becomes attached to the girl in the painting, and comes to believe that the painting is magical. But when Becky goes into the girl's world, she realizes too late that life is not always perfect on the other side.

Plot

The episode begins with Becky making a collage of what her ideal room would look like. This inspired her because her best friend has a perfect room. However, Becky's mother can't afford anything, even if she gets a new job. Becky's mother tries to point out that their life is not so bad, and the reason her friend's room is perfect is because her parents own a chain of dry cleaners and make money. Becky doesn't care, and continues to wish their life could be nicer.

Later, while taking out the trash, Becky notices a beautiful painting of a girl sitting in an elaborately decorated bedroom of a grand old-fashioned house. Becky takes the painting with her, dusts it off and puts it into her room. However, her mother doesn't approve of Becky's fantasies about the painting.

Becky falls asleep after doing her homework. She wakes up and notices that the painting has changed. The girl in the painting, who was sitting in her chair looking at her window, is now standing next to her clock; which now shows a different time (a quarter to six).

Becky at first thinks that her mother has done something to the painting, but then believes that this is no ordinary painting. She inspects it more closely, but after her mother calls her to dinner, the painting now shows a creepy, lizard-like eyeball, looming over the window. However, when Becky's around, the eyeball disappears.

Becky believes that the painting is magic. She tries on a beautiful dress from her closet, trying to look like the girl in the painting. Knowing of Becky's obsession, her mother believes that things have gone way out of hand, and tries to take the painting out of Becky's room. Becky protests and agrees that she'll forget about the painting and do the chores her mother asked. So her mother puts the painting back.

One night when Becky is asleep, she's woken by the girl in the painting, who calls to her that Becky can enter the painting via her closet. Becky does so. She is enchanted by the girl and the room, and says how much she wishes she could live the girl's life. The girl invites Becky to sleep over, and Becky agrees. At this point, a giant lizard-like monster (the owner of the eyeball from earlier) passes by the window and the ground shakes. As Becky screams in horror, the clock strikes six. The girl says it's feeding time. She pulls the lever next to the clock, the whole ceiling opens up and the monster eats Becky alive.

The girl's mother comes into the room and assures her daughter that she did the right thing in luring people into the painting for the monster to eat. The girl regrets what happened to Becky, but her mother says Becky deserved it; the people who believe the painting depicts a perfect world are fools. "It's us or them," she points out as she exits, leaving her daughter to sit by the window waiting for her next victim.